Raise the Hammer

Comment 57329

Oh Portland. North America's best and worst example of New Urbanism. Problem is, they have so much more than LRT (a firm urban boundary, building height restrictions etc) that it's very hard to tell what's going on from any cursory look at a few key numbers.

All this talk about cost and debt reminds me of an old quote from an American politician. He stated that originally he'd been dead-set against the mass transit system proposed for his city because "for that price, you could buy everybody a Buick". Decades later, he confessed that "it's a little more like buying everybody a Buick that lasts for thirty or forty years". Really wish I still had that source.

"Today, the notion of progress in a single line without goal or limit seems perhaps the most parochial notion of a very parochial century."
— Lewis Mumford